College Football Hall of Fame to Atlanta?
We thought we had come up with a brilliant theoretical discussion of why the College Football Hall of Fame should move to Atlanta. Theory is unnecessary because the Atlanta Business Chronicle reported back in December that the Atlanta Sports Council is attempting to negotiate the Hall’s move from South Bend, Indiana to Atlanta. The Chronicle reports one reason why we don’t know about this.
Officials at the Sports Council, a branch of the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce, have sought to keep the talks confidential for fear of the reaction in South Bend and have sworn Sports Council members to secrecy.
We respect Notre Dame’s role as the dynastic patriarch of college football, but this move makes sense for many reasons. While Big Ten fans are the most rabid outside the Southeast, they simply cannot generate the same level of interest. In 2006 the SEC had 8 of the top 20 programs by attendance, the Big Ten only 4. Simply put, more people would visit the Hall of Fame if it was located in Atlanta.
[The World Chess Hall of Fame Has Had Trouble With its Low Income Neighbor, the World Checkers Hall of Fame]
This move is also a good fit for Atlanta in its quest to become college football’s unofficial capital. Should the move happen, it seems likely that the new Labor Day Georgia Dome game, this year featuring Alabama and Clemson, will be called the Hall of Fame Game. This would create synergistic legitimacy for both the game and for the lesser known Hall of Fame. Visitors to this game, the Peach Bowl, and the SEC Championship would all be drawn to the Hall, and don’t forget the numerous away fans that help to fill Bobby Dodd Stadium each week.
Such a game could also help Atlanta lobby for some of the National Championship pork doled out by the BCS each year. Although the Hall of Fame’s presence probably would not be the most significant argument, it’s voice would be added to the chorus of reasons Atlanta should be included in how the National Championship is decided. That chorus is currently known as Raleigh Urbain’s One Man Chorale Group. It’s the least gay men’s chorus in America.
Of course this entire discussion comes amid a raucous debate in the Georgia Legislature over whether the State of Georgia should be involved in the funding of halls of fame. In an article titled, Halls of Fame Strike Some as Money Pits (No bias here), the AJC reports that Hall of Fame flip flopper, Senator Ben Harbin:
[W]ants his powerful committee to take a closer look at all state spending for various halls of fame and museums, many of which are located in the Middle Georgia region that Perdue calls home.
Last year the Governor denied Harbin’s request for substantial funding of a golf hall of fame in Augusta. While this site has been highly critical of Georgia Representative Ben Harbin, we have never critiqued his intelligence. Georgians love college football, and personal game day empirical evidence suggests that Georgia Republicans love it even more. While Senator Ben Harbin may be willing to go after the easy prey of rarely visited museums in small towns, he is politically savvy enough to realize the power college football commands. A highly publicized fight over funding this Hall of Fame, while not political suicide, would undoubtedly sully Harbin’s image with a large section of his conservative base.
Filed under: College Football (aka God's Special Gift to You and Me)
Tags: Atlanta, Ben Harbin, Blog, College Football, Hall of Fame
4 comments
How about starting the Georgia Pork Hall of Fame? We could waste tax dollars on a museum featuring exhibits of museums that waste tax dollars. Think of the tourism potential.
We could call it the Sam Nunn Pork Hall of Fame in honor of the US Senator who so frequently brought home the military bacon.
You may not want to hear this as a Georgia fan, but college football owes a heck of a lot to Georgia Tech. Or, more accurately, to its coach from 1904-1919: John Heisman (that Heisman).
While it’s nice that Heisman has the most prestigious individual award in the sport named after him, his real contribution was as the man who was most influential in bringing the forward pass to college football (with help from a few others). That was the first step in shaping the game into the form it is recognized as today.
The baseball Hall of Fame is in Cooperstown because of the story (believed to be false, but I don’t think that much matters now) of Abner Doubleday inventing the game in a farm near the town. If people are going to argue for the placement of a Hall of Fame in a town based purely on the historic games that have taken place there, then the baseball Hall of Fame would need to be in New York CIty.
An argument on the basis of how Cooperstown was chosen would dictate that a CFHOF be located in New Jersey, since the first game was played between Rutgers and Princeton there in 1869. There’s a good argument to be made there, but the counter-argument is that the game hadn’t evolved much past Rugby until the forward pass came into play. That’s where a pretty strong case for Atlanta can be made.
Either way, I don’t think South Bend’s claim is quite as strong as maybe some people who live there would like to think it is.
There is not a truly valid argument for New Jersey. Baseball is very popular sport in New York and in the states it borders. This is not the case for college football in the Northeast and Mid Atlantic.
We are well aware of John Heisman’s tenure at Tech, but don’t sell Bobby Dodd short. His name is on the stadium and he is a far greater figure in Georgia Tech lore.
Your Heisman comment reminds us that another legendary coach, Pop Warner, first coached collegiate football at UGA.
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